There have in the past been provided a plurality of guides for guiding hair follicles into engagement with the cutting edge of a razor blade for the purpose of enhancing the cutting characteristics and also for providing safe use of the razor assembly.
All of the guides heretofore known have had for their primary purpose the stretching of the skin for the purpose of flatening the skin into engagement with the cutting edge and separating the hair follicles. This concept, while certainly achieving a significant commercial acceptance, when viewed in light of the present invention, is not the most advantageous way of guiding the skin and hair follicles into engagement with the razor cutting blade edge.
One such prior construction is shown in the Gunnar P. Michelson U.S. Pat. No. 3,750,285 issued Aug. 7, 1973. This construction consists of a curved blade assembly with a rounded guide projecting forwardly therefrom. The guide serves to stretch the skin and separate the hair follicles in a conventional manner. The guide is rounded in configuration and does not extend above the plane of the cutting blade itself. Another form of the prior art is shown in the Langdon U.S. Pat. No. 2,434,275 which illustrates certain discrete guide members of U-shaped figuration at the ends of the blades for the purpose of stretching the skin, but these are resilient in construction, not pointed in configuration and do not extend above the plane of the blade member itself.
A still further form of the prior art is illustrated in the Smith U.S. Pat. No. 1,497,647 wherein a guide member 14 is provided for stretching the skin. However, as viewed clearly in the drawings of that patent and the specification, the guide member 14 does not extend above the plane of the blade, is not pointed in configuration and is also resiliently mounted so that it will yield under the normal pressures of cutting.